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Sunday, May 4, 2014

The Hold Still by Lisa Regan Blog Tour - Suspense Feature and Giveaway

After saving her three-year-old daughter from a car-jacking, off-duty
police detective Jocelyn Rush ends up in the ER. The last person she
expects to run into is Anita Grant, former prostitute and an old
acquaintance from Jocelyn’s days on patrol. In spite of her obvious
injuries—mutilated hands and feet—Anita refuses to talk about what
happened. Reluctantly, Jocelyn backs off, and Anita’s case goes
to Philadelphia’s Special Victims Unit.Before long, Jocelyn is pulled into the SVU’s investigation. Anita
is finally ready to talk, but only to Jocelyn. Her story is harrowing,
even to a seasoned veteran like Jocelyn. Working with SVU, Jocelyn’s
investigation unearths a series of similar crimes going back four
years. Three men are preying on local prostitutes, viciously assaulting
and mutilating them.The police apprehend two of the suspects, but the third eludes
capture. As the hunt for the most sadistic of the three intensifies, and
his crimes escalate, Jocelyn and her colleagues have precious few
leads. Then a monster from Jocelyn’s past resurfaces. She doesn’t want
to be reminded of the terrible secret that destroyed her family nearly
twenty years earlier, but the man offers her a lead that could crack
Anita’s case.To solve it, Jocelyn must connect her past with her present—before a sadistic attacker sets his sights on her.

Excerpt:

Jocelyn
glanced at the house. The screen door was cracked just a little; and
there was a flash of a plastic, yellow Shop Rite bag peeking out. She
peered back at Olivia and paused a long moment to see if Olivia would
wake up now that the car had stopped moving. But the snoring continued
unabated. Jocelyn turned away from Olivia, catching her own smile in the
rearview mirror. Just looking at Olivia made her grin. Most of the
time, she didn’t realize she was doing it. It amazed her that this tiny
person could be such a powerhouse of joy.

Unless she doesn’t have her blanket, Jocelyn thought wryly.

Jocelyn took a quick look
up and down the street, gauging how long it would take her to sprint to
Martina’s door and back. It shouldn’t take more than ten seconds. As a
rule, she never left Olivia alone in the car—not even when she was
paying for gas—but the door was only twenty feet away. It would be
faster to run for it than to unfasten Olivia’s seat belt and carry her
to and fro.

Jocelyn slipped her seat
belt off and got out, closing the door softly behind her. She sprinted
up the steps and snatched the bag from between the doors. As she turned
back to her car, she saw the figure, just a blur in her periphery. Then
her Ford Explorer drove off down Chew Avenue with Olivia in the back
seat.

Jocelyn leapt off the steps and ran into the street.

“Olivia!” she screamed.

She had never run so fast,
and was only vaguely aware of the other cars whizzing past, beeping and
swerving to avoid her, expletives rolling out of the mouths of passing
motorists. The Explorer made the first right onto North 21st
Street and Jocelyn followed, arms and legs pumping, feet slapping the
pavement, her heartbeat thundering in her ears. She reached for her gun
but quickly remembered she didn’t have it. It was her day off.

“Dammit.”

She was losing ground as the Explorer turned right onto Conlyn and out of her sight.

“Olivia!”

Every muscle in her body
strained and screamed, her lungs burning. She turned the corner and
almost wept with relief. The Explorer was stopped behind someone who had
double-parked in the middle of the street. There wasn’t enough room for
it to pass. The other car’s blinkers were on, the driver nowhere to be
seen. For once, Philadelphia’s narrow side streets were a blessing
instead of a curse.

Breathing heavily, Jocelyn
approached the Explorer from the drivers’ side and opened the door. She
didn’t look; instead she grabbed and grabbed until she had a handful of
clothing. She pulled a skinny, punk kid—maybe nineteen or twenty—out of
the car by his collar.

His face was pimpled with a
patchy five o’clock shadow. His white-blond hair was greasy, a shock of
it falling across his coal-dark eyes as he glared at her. “Hey, what
the hell are you—”

The whole world went
silent. Jocelyn knew the kid was speaking, but she couldn’t hear
anything. Her field of vision narrowed to his face. And when he met her
eyes, for a brief, fleeting second, he looked afraid. Then Jocelyn hit
him. She hit him again and again. He fought back, but his ineffectual
punches glanced off her body; no match for her rage. By the time she was
done, she had a few bruises and her right wrist throbbed, but she
didn’t remember the particulars. She only remembered hitting him until
he lay at her feet, unmoving. Her vehicle had rolled forward a few feet,
bumping the rear of the car that was double-parked. A few people had
come out of their homes. They stood on the pavement and on porches,
staring open-mouthed.

Jocelyn’s hearing returned
slowly. Her labored breath was deafening. She left the kid on the ground
and pulled open the back door of the Explorer. There sat Olivia in her
car seat, face flushed with sleep. Her little round face was relaxed,
her mouth open. A strand of brown hair stuck to one of her cheeks. She
sighed softly in her sleep, one tiny hand clutching Lulu, the pink
beanie bear that accompanied them everywhere.

“Oh God,” Jocelyn gasped.
She put her Explorer in park and then sat in the back, weeping
uncontrollably. She dialed 911 on her cell phone.

Lisa Regan is a suspense novelist. She has a Bachelor’s Degree in
English and Master of Education Degree from Bloomsburg University. She
is a member of Sisters In Crime. She lives in Philadelphia with her
husband and daughter. Her debut novel, Finding Claire Fletcher won Best Heroine and was runner up in Best Novel in the eFestival of Words Best of the Independent eBook Awards for 2013.